Identifying WWI Troopship Picture Postcards

Introduction

You may have an image of a ship that appears to be
old, but you don't know if it depicts a First World
War US troopship.
The very first place to go is this amazing
website:
World War I Era Transports -- Organized by Type
.
I will add some guidelines here
that may also help you to be more certain about the
age of the image:

If you have
a JWB card, then the identifying
is over. These cards are easy to spot, since
they have a very similar format, and always
include the logo of the JWB. They all appear to
have been issued for returning troops after
the Armistice. None are known that depict any
other ships. Note, however, that the images used
on these cards are generally from the pre-war
era.

Going beyond the JWB cards, any card with
a date is very useful. Sometimes
a soldier wrote on the back of a card
indicating the date, even if the card was
not mailed. Troops were still being returned
to the US in late 1919. Some of the soldiers in
Siberia did not get back until 1921 (!)

If the card has no date, but it is a real-photo card,
you can
get an idea of the general time period by
checking
this helpful site.
The site has images of the backs of real photo cards
from many eras. Unfortunately, the real-photo stock listed
on the site was used during a period that spans the War
era for maybe 10 years on either side.

Over the years, collectors of primarily picture
postcards of ships have discovered many
real-photo cards
that were created by a variety of publishers and
photographers during the war era. Sometimes they are marked with the
name of the
publisher or photographer, and sometimes they aren't.

If a ship is in its
official livery (especially smokestack logos
and colors), then it is unlikely
that this is a war-era image. The exception
to this are German liners taken as
war reparations and used for returning
troops. They would have no need for
special camoflage. Here is
an image
of the British liner Aquitania [48k JPG] displaying a very
nice painting of the ship in her wartime "livery".

The ship has life rafts hanging off the
sides. Rafts were only used on troopships.
As liners were being converted to troopships,
the planners quickly determined that
lifeboats would be useless on a
ship crammed with thousands
of soldiers. When trouble did come
(in the form of a torpedo), the rafts proved to be
very helpful. So, any ocean liner
seen with big oval rafts along its sides was
a troopship. Here is an image of
the U.S.S. Maui in war configuration, clearly
showing the life rafts.

The ship has a name starting with
"USS". While civilian ships had the designation
SS (steamship), they became official US
vessels for troop carrying. The names
were altered on the hull to show
this new name.
This is an image of
the
U.S.S. Matsonia showing the altered name on the bow.

The ship is flying the US jack on
the bow. The official naval jack
is a flag with only the star field
of the US flag
(no stripes). This flag was reserved
for use by US naval vessels only.
So, what might have been a civilian
liner would only fly this ensign
on the bow, if it were a US
troopship.
This is an image of the
U.S.S. Mercury showing the jack flying from the bow.

The ship has
deck guns. Of course,
peacetime ocean liners rarely had
large caliber guns on their decks. These
guns were added for convoy
duty to help repulse submarine
attacks.

The ship has one or more very
large and high "crows nests". While most
ocean liners had high-level lookouts, these
were augmented (and increased) for anti-submarine
duty during wartime.

For instance, contrast
these two real photo picture postcards of
the Calamares. First, seen
before the war, and then
during the war.
Note the presence of the high crows nests installed for
convoy operations. Not only could these high
vantage points be used to spot submarines,
but they could also help direct the ship's gunfire at
the sub.

The soldiers in the picture are
wearing the "campaign hat" (now more likely known
as the "Smokey Bear" hat.). Army
men going overseas wore this style hat.
The hats can be seen in this photo of
some soldiers on board a troopship visiting with the
soldiers at the dock.

Note that Army men returning from
Europe wore the
U. S. Army overseas cap, an item
much more familiar to us, as it
was used in WW II and onwards.